The Truth about Cats and Dogs

Meet the breeds, in numbers

Illustration Claire Eckstrom

Come the end of this month, it’ll literally be raining cats and dogs in New York City. Okay, maybe not literally, but there will be a great many furry critters racing, leaping and flouncing around during the American Kennel Club’s “Meet the Breeds” event, which is being billed as “the world’s largest gathering of dogs and cats.”

It’s unclear if it’s officially the largest gathering ever, but we can confirm that the meet will feature more than 200 breeds, that the average cat can jump five times its own height without the aid of a trampoline and that a fairly intelligent dog can understand up to 200 words. Here, a selection of similarly thought-provoking facts.